Bush v. Cheney on Consumption and Savings

As I was reading another gem from Brad Setser on the Dark Matter controversy (Brad links to a very nice paper by Carol Corrado, Charles Hutten, and Daniel Sichel that shows the investment/GDP ratio has declined even if one included investment in intangible capital), one of his readers points out an AP story where Dick Cheney is telling people to save more. While that might be sound advice and good for long-term growth prospects, I sort of recall President Bush justifying those tax “cuts” (actually deferrals of tax obligations) by saying he wanted to give people their money back so they could consume more. Yes – we are ruled by idiots.